I happened to see the author on a book talk show and then pick up this thin novel shortly after. Though not overly impressive, this fictional tale of two men who love the same woman also manages to provide some historical data on the Trinity Project and archeology. Set in the desert , the two men have an obviously opposing agenda: one has found an important dig, the other is facilitating the detonation of the H bomb. In this landscape there appears also to be only one attractive girl and both set out to win her. I found the writing unremarkable, but did enjoy learning about the the work of the two men. ( )

2571 Countrymen of Bones, by Robert Olen Butler (read 21 Jan 1994) This 1983 novel is laid at Alamogordo, New Mexico, in 1945, while the atomic bomb is being built. It tells of a nutty archeologist digging up Indian bones and an equally nutty physicist working on the bomb, who both want Anna. Fortunately Butler feels people were more moral in 1945 so we are spared the erotic scatology of his Vietnam novel, The Alleys of Eden. I did not like this book. I thought it was boring and ridiculous in its plot. This book was a failure as a novel. ( )